Riley's Biggest Challenge
by LC-Lawliet
Summary: Riley Poole has dealt with it all working with Ben, right? Nope! With his brother brutally murdered, Riley now finds himself with his 13-year old neice. The trouble is, she knows about the treasure Ben is seeking, and Riley is pulled into the madness. R
1. Chapter 1

**A/N. Okay this is my first NT fic, so please be nice and give me lots of reviews on advice/ideas/ etc. of stuff, that and I like reviews, so REVIEW PLLEEEEAAAASSSSSEEEE!**

It was slowly darkening in the city as Riley Poole sat content in his small apartment, typing away as he started a sequel to his book. To his surprise, there was a loud knock at the door. _What could Ben want now? He just left here a few hours ago. _He thought, slightly annoyed, as he sighed, slouching off reluctantly to the door. However, when he opened it, it wasn't Ben after all; Instead, a man dressed in all black stood in the doorway of Riley's small two-bedroom apartment, which the second bedroom was filled with all of his electronic gadgets and such. The man looked at Riley and began to speak—

"Riley Poole?" the man asked, making sure he had the right address.

"Yeah, that's me," Riley said with a worried tone.

"Agent Sanders, I am part of the city Police Department," The man introduced himself "Mr. Poole, have you been in contact with your brother Andrew lately?" Agent Sanders asked with a grim tone.

"Well, not since last Christmas." Riley answered with question in his voice. "Why? Is there anything I should know?" now he was clearly getting worried.

"Mr. Poole, your brother was murdered this afternoon, nobody knows anything about who did it except for his daughter, your niece Jenna, which brings me to another problem…" said Sanders.

"And that is?" said Riley rushing Sanders with his worry.

"The girl needs a guardian, her mom died not long after Christmas, Her godfather has been dead for three years now. You are the only family she has Mr. Poole, will you take her in? Or should we try to find a foster home?" Riley shuddered at the mentioned of the foster home, he took in a deep sigh, this was going to be hard.

"I'll take her." Sanders nodded,

"We'll bring her by tomorrow morning at ten," He said. Riley nodded and rushed off to actually _find _the bed in his second bedroom, and to move all of his tech stuff.

--Rileypoolerox--

By the next morning, Riley found the bed and was able find the small full-sized bed in the second room and put his gadgets into two boxes in the corner of the room. The clock ticked closer to ten o'clock, there was a knock on his door, and Riley ran to the door to greet his now-orphaned niece.

"Jenna!" he said opening the door, hugging the person in the doorway.

"It's nice to see you too Riley…" said a very surprised Ben.

"Oh," said Riley turning red and pulling away. "I was expecting my niece, I am uh, her new guardian. Uh Ben? Could you give me any advice on how to become a little closer to her? I mean, I never really talked to the kid much and now I'm her only living relative, I need help." Said Riley hoping for some relief in all of the drama and mayhem. Ben bit his lip in thought.

"Depends, how old is she?" he said, making Riley's eyes light up.

"She just turned thirteen in May." Riley answered.

"Why not do things she likes, like shopping or something, girls like that stuff," Ben advised. "I guess I'll leave, this can wait, get aquatinted with your niece better. Riley nodded and said goodbye to his friend. About fifteen minutes later there was another knock on the door.

He jumped up and answered the door. There in the doorway stood Agent Sanders and Jenna. They were just finishing a conversation when he opened the door.

"Now Jenna, if you need to talk to me or anything, my cell phone number is programmed into your phone alright?" Sanders said giving directions to the thirteen-year-old. She nodded slowly and sadly. Sanders began to talk again, "I want you to call me as soon as you settle in okay," she again nodded.

Jenna turned until her tear-filled blue eyes were locked with Riley's. Almost immediately she leapt into him, wrapped her arms around his neck, and buried her head into his shoulder. Riley pulled her closer as she began to sob loudly.

"I'm sorry," said Riley, knowing that what Jenna was experiencing was really hard. After a few moments, she calmed down. Sanders turned to Riley as well.

"She may be like that for a while." Sanders informed, the other man nodded. Sanders also informed him about important information etc. and then Riley and Jenna said goodbye to Sanders and Riley showed Jenna around. Eventually he came to her room. She didn't speak, but by the expression of her face and how plain the room was, Riley could tell that she was thinking about redecorating.

"You can change anything in here if you want," Riley informed.

"'Kay. Thanks," Jenna said, he could tell she was like he was when he was young-a soft spoken person. Reaching into one of her bags as she began to unpack. Riley could see how unhappy she was in everything she did, he realized that he really wanted to become close to her as her father once was.

"Hey, why don't we do something tomorrow?" Riley asked, taking Ben's advice.

"Like what?" Jenna asked.

"Anything you want, tomorrow's your day," replied Riley, trying to lighten Jenna's mood. Jenna seemed to ponder the thought. She gave Riley a half smile,

"Okay." She said. Little did Riley know how much he was in for…

A/N**: PLEASE REVIEW! I'M BEGGING YOU!**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Sorry for the long wait on updates, I know it's been about a month, I was in the middle of an idea when school stole my attention, but luckily, thanks to a short attention span and a boring health class, I got this idea! Please review, and remember this is my first attempt at NT so, I may have people OOC and I am open to any advice from people who write a lot of NT fics! Oh, and the shoe thing…I do that alot**

The next day came quickly, Riley was up at seven and had breakfast done by eight. Jenna got up about seven thirty, not voluntarily though. After breakfast, Riley took Jenna to the mall for some 'bonding' as they walked through the crowded building, Riley tried to think of stores a thirteen-year-old girl would shop at. They came across a store that said "Hollister" at the top, he had noticed many girls Jenna's age wearing shirts with that same logo.

"You want to go in?" Riley asked as it drew near.

"Ew. God no! I hate Hollister," Jenna replied. The came to a store called "Hot Topic" and to Riley' surprise, Jenna went in. Riley followed slowly, the store kind of freaked him out, they had strange belts and freaky-looking band t-shirts everywhere, not to mention the cashier was in his opinion, scary-looking she had bushy black hair with red streaks in it, black lipstick, and several piercings including and eyebrow and tongue and many others. (**A/N**: **Not meaning to offend anyone, I saw a person exactly like that while shopping at Hot Topic and I thought it was really neat, but she was mean, don't ask)**

Jenna was quick to go to the band T-shirts and she grabbed a black one that read _My Chemical Romance, _and at the bottom, _the Black Parade is Dead!_and the second was white and read _AC/DC Back in Black (A__**/N, I bought these yesterday!)**_. Jenna hurried and whipped out a frequent buyer card and twenty dollars, as soon as she got her change she followed Riley out of the store.

"Is is just me or was that cashier kinda creepy, she kept growling at me," said Jenna, Riley nodded in agreement. Next they entered a CD store, again, the young man tried to guess what his niece liked.

"Hey, there's Jonas Brothers stuff over here," He said, knowing how oddly, many teenaged girls liked the Jonas Brothers.

"Again ew," said Jenna, biting back a laugh, Riley wasn't very good at guessing. This time Jenna picked several sorts out, she grabbed and Iron Maiden CD, which the picture of Eddie (Iron Maiden's mascot) scared Riley, an AC/DC CD, and surprisingly, the CD of one of Riley's favorite bands, to pay, she pulled out a gift card from her shoe.

"How many cards do you have? More importantly, why do you put them in your shoe?" Riley laughed as his niece hopped a few times, trying to put the gift card back in her shoe.

They decided to go to the food court for lunch. Again, Riley was surprised when she ordered the same thing he did. _Maybe this isn't as hard as I thought it would be,_ Riley grinned.

"Riley!" someone called from behind, when he turned he saw Abigail bustling toward him, several large shopping bags in hand. "What brings you here?" she asked, finally making her way toward him through the crowd.

"Well, I'm attempting to get inside the personality of my niece," He motioned to Jenna, pulling money out of her shoe again, in line at a smoothie stand.

"Babysitting?" Abi guessed.

"Try legal guardian-ing" he retorted. "By the way, you're a girl, help me! She isn't like the teenaged girls on TV that always love pink and girly things," he pleaded.

"Okay, try asking her what she likes." Abi said as she rolled her eyes. Typical Riley. Jenna returned to the table.

"Hey Jenna, this is my friend Abigail Chase," Riley introduced. The teen's eyes had a spark.

"You mean _this_ is _Mean Declaration Lady_?" Jenna asked in anticipation.

"What kind of nonsense have you been telling her Riley?" demanded Abigail.

"He hasn't told me anything, his book did, haven't you read it? Chapter nine, page one-twenty-seven, fourth paragraph, third sentence." said Jenna, reciting a section from _Cibola._

"Yeah, haven't you read my book?" Riley asked skeptically, giving Abi sad puppy eyes, she felt bad, he really wanted Ben and Abigail to read his book.

"Well, um, no," she said.

"It's one of the best books ever! I mean, yeah, he skipped a few good conspiracies but it's still a great book, and I'm not just saying that because he's my uncle either,"

Riley smiled, maybe this would be easy, all he had to do was ask stuff like What her favorite color was, Jenna's personality turned out to be a lot like his, she listened to some of the same music, she was one of the very few people who actually _read _his book.

"You know Ben Gates right?" Jenna asked the woman.

"Yeah, why?" asked Abigail.

"Can you get his autograph for me? I'm a really big history fan, and um, yeah, I want his autograph!"

"Um, sure." said Abigail. Riley half-expected Jenna to pull something out of her shoe like a picture of Ben.

Later on, after a few more places, Riley and Jenna finally returned to Riley's apartment.

"Thanks Uncle Riley, I had fun," she said.

"Don't call me uncle. Please. It makes me feel old." the young man pouted.

"What do you want me to call you then?" she asked.

"just Riley or one of those girly alternations or something," said Riley.

"Okay," Jenna replied. Then the two sat in a awkward silence, neither having the slightest idea of what to say.

"Sooo," Riley started. "Since you're stuck with me, how about you tell me about yourself. Apparently, I'm not a very good guesser,"

"Uh, what do you want to know?" asked the confused teen.

"Let's start with simple things first like your favorite color, or movie and why you keep stuff in your shoe…" Jenna couldn't help but laugh over the last one.

" Okay, well, my favorite color is purple. My all time favorite movie is Pirates of the Caribbean. I've got a huge Twilight Saga obsession, they are my favorite books, with Cibola in second. Um, I play guitar and piano, and I like rock music. I'm also kind of a tech geek, great with computers. And I keep stuff in my shoe because usually, if you get robbed, the robber will look for your purse or wallet, but usually not your shoes!" Jenna replied.

"You?" she added.

"Well, I like tech stuff too. My favorite band is Black Sabbath, um, Cibola's my favorite book because I wrote it. And um, I'm the sidekick of Ben Gates that has a red Ferrari,"--again, another awkward silence.

There was a knock at Riley's door, Jenna jumped up to open it. "Hello," said Ben to the now speechless girl. "Riley, I found something, I brought it over," he continued. Riley came over to the door.

"Ben, this is my niece Jenna. Jenna, this is Ben," Riley introduced. Jenna was seconds away from hyperventilating.

"H-hi," she stammered as they shook hands. "don't move!" she said, running off to her room and returning with an autograph book, she then pulled a pen out of her shoe. "Can I have your autograph?" she said. Ben smiled and gladly signed her book. "thanks!" she exclaimed, putting the pen back in it's original origin.

"Don't ask." said Riley.

**A/N: Please review**


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed

**A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed! Please, hear me out on this, if you have any ideas or advice for someone like me who is new to the National Treasure archive, don't even hesitate to share any of it. **

Chapter Three: The Clue

The clue Ben had found was a journal entry, folded up and stuffed into the back of a book from the 1800's he had found earlier. The clue said

_July 3__rd__ 1863._

_Today I was lucky, our brigade, led by General Pickett, charged the union, or at least attempted too, the Union men shot at us the whole way there. Most of the men died, I was one of the ones lucky enough to get over that wall before I died too. I was badly injured though, and I was taken to a near by farm, who's barn was a hospital. The landlady was kind enough to help us poor Rebels, even though we probably scared the daylights outta her. I got to meet her little daughter Anna too, that child is the sweetest I ever saw. I talked to little Anna too, while I was being stitched up to distract me from the pain, she has a little dolly named Sarah, the same name of my little sister down home in Atlanta. Oh, and I have to have my leg amputated, I don't think I'll fight anymore, I can't move very fast on my crutches yet and if I has to do some more runnin' like the charge, I know I won't make it._

_November 19, 1863_

_It's been a long time since I've written anything in this here journal… _

_The Union's leader, president Abraham Lincoln gave a speech today here on the battlefield; he honored all of the dead, from both sides. I overheard some of his officers speaking about how they'd heard of secret writing on the back from one of the confederate leaders that wrote some sort of map of how to find a Union treasure that some spy had written down before he was caught. I was able to catch a glimpse of the back though, there was nothing, Lincoln probably re-wrote his speech. If only I could find the treasure…_

"What does it mean?" asked Riley.

"It means that like the Declaration of Independence, there is an invisible map or clue thingy on the back of the Gettysburg Address?" Jenna guessed. Ben's eyes found their way toward hers.

"That is exactly what it says, good work Jenna." Jenna smirked.

"I have Ben Gates complimenting me on helping find a treasure, I wonder if the teachers will buy this if I have to write one of those 'what I did over summer vacation' papers. By the way, I am helping to find the treasure," said Jenna.

"No you're not!" rebuked Riley.

"Then I'll be home alone while you three are off on some wild adventure. I can hear the party music already…" his niece argued. Riley grumbled, he had to bring her along, which could be dangerous.

"But there is one problem with that," Ben interrupted. "Which copy of the Address would it be? There were five drafts."

"What are you talking about? I've only heard of one document and it was the Gettysburg Address, not the Gettysburg 5th edition Address," said a confused Riley. Jenna ignored his remark and spoke up.

"It would probably be the Nicolay or the Hay copy; they were the first written around November nineteenth. The other three, the Everett, Bancroft, and Bliss were written well afterward. But I'd try the Nicolay, it was said to be the very first, so the spies would most likely have gone for the first document they heard of, which was probably the Nicolay," said Jenna, receiving odd 'how can you possibly know this stuff?' looks from the men, "what? I'm a history geek, don't judge!"

"Okay, so we're looking for this Nicolay guy's Address, but where would it be now? Does it even exist?" Riley asked, completely clueless of the conversation _I guess I should have stayed awake in history class, _he thought to himself.

"Well," Ben began to explain, "John Nicolay was said to have kept it in his possession until his death, which afterward his copy was passed to Lincoln's other private secretary John Hay, which stayed with him for a period of time, then it ended up in—,"

"The Library of Congress in D.C.," Jenna finished for him.

"Jenna!" whined Riley, "Stop pulling a Ben, I'm older than you and I don't even know half of this," Jenna rolled her eyes and turned back to Ben.

"So…let me guess, we're going to go steal it right?" she guessed.

"Wrong, the president wanted me to help him with this, so we'll just get it through him, so for once we can avoid getting chased by cops," Ben replied. She frowned, how come when there was a bunch of action like having to break in and steal the declaration of independence, she wasn't around to have a part, and now that she is finally part of the action, there is no awesome action.

Ben noticed her frown and seemed to read her mind, "Don't worry, if this goes like the other treasures I went after, there will still be a lot of action,"

Their discovery conversation was put to a halt by a news bulletin on the muted TV.

_Breaking news: Convicted Criminal Ian Howe Escapes from Washington D.C. Prison._ The moving letters at the bottom of the screen read repeatedly.

"Oh crap," said Riley, "hopefully he hasn't heard of this treasure," he un-muted the TV. After the report, the three's jaws all dropped, Ian had heard of what was on page forty-seven, and they'd have to race and fight him, again. _Well, at least this will have some action. _Jenna thought, freaked out and happy at the same time.

**A/N: Please review! Oh, and everything about the Nicolay copy part of the Gettysburg address (except for the part with the Confederate spies and the treasure map) is all true, I looked it up! Please review as a reward for all my hard research!**


	4. Chapter 4

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: NOT A CHAPTER**

**I am so sorry about this people (especially those who leave precious reviews) I haven't updated this in forever (well, I re-vamped a few chapters…which honestly took time because I added a lot…) but as for the actual plot I'm lost, I have side stuff in it, but honestly I don't know where to take this at the moment, every idea I get ends up creating a big, gaping plot hole (but on the bright side I wrote four chapters that will appear in the future if I can make chapter four somehow possible. **

**Again, I am terribly sorry about this, and it breaks my heart to say it but this story is on hiatus until I get an idea. **

**In other news….I have decided to turn this into a contest-like thing. Send me ideas and whoever has the idea that makes this debilitating writer's block leave will have their idea as Chapter 4(but it cannot create a plot-hole…or this thing would be about ten chapters long already) so, until then, this story is on hiatus. But check out my other ones, that aren't (Betrayal is also on hiatus though, but check it out anyway). **

**I'm so sorry!**

**-Leia**


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